How to download photos from google photos

In this article, you will get different Methods to download photos from Google photos. Moments become memories and memories make us reminisce about our past. We all capture these moments to be able to remember them in the future too. Google Photos allows us to store these memories for the years that are yet to come. We can store all our photos and videos and create and share albums with others. With the aid of Artificial Intelligence, Google Photos also customizes this experience for each individual. It can recognize faces and places, group photos of people, and create custom memories that enhance the whole app experience. The best part is that it is stored in the cloud, so you access your memories anytime, anywhere. All you need is access to your Google account and you’re good to go!

With all these things to offer, we understand the need to download your backed-up photos on your device from Google Photos. In this article, we will look into exactly that. We’ll be understanding how to download photos from Google Photos. We will go into the details of how you can download them using your mobile and PC/laptop. We will also look at walkthroughs of how we can download one and many photos from this application. And if we wish to create a backup of all the pictures to create some storage space in the app, how can we download ALL the photos at once from google photos. Yes, this is possible as well! We have so much to learn in this article, so let’s begin.

How to download photos from Google Photos on mobile devices?

Mobile devices are the main source via which we capture media these days. The captured image or video is backed up automatically in our Google Photos, based on the settings mentioned. We can choose to manage the frequency of the backup, which folders to back up to achieve efficient space storage, etc through the application. As most of the media is backed up in Google Photos via mobile devices, we can also save space by deleting the media that is present locally on the device. This not only allows us to make efficient use of the memory of our mobile devices but also avoids duplicate files from being present on the same device. And if we ever require any media to be present locally on our mobiles, to be able to edit it or share it with our friends, we can download it very easily from Google Photos. 

Mobile devices generally have Google Photos pre-installed on them. But in case it is not already present, you can easily download it from Google Play Store. Just go to Google Play Store and search for Google Photos. Download the first application that you can see in the search results. Once downloaded, you will be prompted to log in via your Google account. After you have logged in, you will be able to see all of your photos and videos which have been backed up via the cloud storage services. Let us now see how pictures and videos are downloaded on our mobile devices.

1. Open the Google Photos application.

2. Choose the desired photo/video that you wish to download to your device.
3. Click on the three-dotted menu icon in the top-right corner.

4. You will be able to see various options such as People in the media (which identifies each person in the image/video), the Location (which tells us where the media was captured –  you can choose to turn off the access to your location through the settings), etc. Choose the “Download” option and your media will start downloading.

5. To look for the downloaded file, you can either find it in your mobile’s default gallery or by going to the file explorer and then searching in the downloads folder. 

Note: You can only download one media at a time using your mobile devices, be it Android or iOS. To be able to download multiple or all of your media you will have to use your PCs or laptops. We will cover how to do that in the following sections of this article, so read on!

How to download photos from Google Photos on your PC or Laptop?

You might want to download media on your laptops or your PCs for many reasons. You may wish to create a backup of your media locally on your pc. Some of your pictures might need some editing before uploading them on your social media. You could also want to create a youtube video using the raw footage which is present in your google photos. Working and editing content on your personal computers and/or laptops is, after all, way more efficient, clean and user-friendly. Whatever the reason may be, you would be required to download your media on your laptop/pc. 

In the case of these devices, however, you will not have to download any specific application for Google Photos as you had to do in the case of mobile devices. You just require internet access and you will be able to download the photos and videos that you want. For doing so, you will have to search for “Google Photos” on google or access it via the shortcut apps on your homepage. When you have opened the Google Photos website on your laptop/pc you are ready to download your media! One benefit of using a laptop/pc to download your captured memories is that you are not limited to downloading one media at a time. You can download multiple as well as all of your media at once when you’re downloading via these devices. Let’s look at all these methods one by one.

Download one media at a time

To download one media at a time on your laptop or pc, the process is relatively simple. First, open any web browser of your preference. Open the Google Photos website. You will be prompted to log in via your Google account if you are not already logged in. After logging in, you will be able to see all your media, albums, shared galleries, etc that are stored or backed up on your Google cloud.

1. Click on the Photos option on the left pane to view all of your media.

2. Find the image or video that you wish to download from your gallery.
3. Click on the target photo/video. 
4. On the top-right corner, you will see a three-dotted menu icon. Click on it.

5. Click on the Download option for the download to start automatically. Alternatively, you can also use the shortcut Shift+D to download your intended media file.

6. Once downloaded, you can find your downloaded media in the Downloads folder of your system.

Download multiple media at once

Now let’s move on to the things that you weren’t able to do with your mobile devices – downloading multiple media at once! If you wish to share some media with a friend of yours, you won’t have to go through the cumbersome process of downloading one media at a time anymore. Just select all the images and videos that you need to share, download them in one go, and share them. It’s that easy!

1. To be able to perform this task, first open the Google Photos website.
2. Click on the Photos option present on the left panel.
3. Select all the desired media by clicking on the small checkmark icon present in the top-left corner of each image/video. 
4. Once selected, go to the three-dotted menu icon present on the top-right corner of the screen and click Download. Alternatively, you can also press Shift+D to begin the download.
5. Since multiple files have to be downloaded, the download doesn’t take place individually for each media file. Instead, a zip folder is downloaded which has all the selected media present within.
6. You can choose to extract the files in the zip folder once it has been downloaded to be able to work on them individually.

Download all the media from Google Photos at once

If you have ever previously tried to download all your media from Google Photos using the above batch download method, you would have found out that there is no straightforward way of doing this. This is because you cannot find an option to select all of your media on the Google Photos website at once and just click Shift+D and go about your day. This, however, doesn’t also mean that downloading all your media in one go isn’t possible! Here, we’ll be introducing you to another website called Google Takeout which allows you to take out the data associated with your Google account with you (no pun intended). Using this website you can download your media from Google Photos, and everything from your Drive data to your Chrome weblogs is yours to take out (ok, I’ll stop now). 

Downloading via Google Takeout

We understand now that Google Takeout is the answer to downloading our data from Google cloud to our local device and/or hard drive. So, let’s learn how we can do this!

1. Go to the Google Takeout website and log into your Google account. 

2. After you have logged in, you will see a plethora of data that you can download locally. You can choose to download all your data, but for the sake of this article, we will click on the deselect all option and just select the Google Photos option. 

3. On clicking on Multiple formats, you will be able to see the formats in which your data will be downloaded.

4. On clicking on All Photo Albums Included, you will be able to see the albums which will be downloaded. If you haven’t segregated your media into different albums, you need not worry because Google already created year-based albums for you! Just click on which album you wish to download, and click ok.
5. Scroll down, and click on Next Step.
6. In the next section, you can choose how you will be able to access the downloaded media. Choose your desired method.

7. Choose the frequency of the download if you wish that this type of download should happen at regular intervals of time.

8. At last, choose the file type of the download and its size. Keep in mind that zip file sizes that are greater than 2GB will be compressed in zip64 which might not be able to open in older systems. 
9. Once all the desired settings are made, click on Create export.
10. Your export will now begin. It may take several hours or even days to create the export depending on the size of the download. However, you will be notified as soon as the export is complete through your preferred method. 
11. You can also access your export via Google Takeout itself. Just log in whenever you wish to access your data and you will find the Manage Exports button. Click this and choose from all of your data exports.

Conclusion

In this article, we have deep-dived into understanding how to download photos from google photos. We first understood the whole idea behind Google Photos and why it is essential to back up our memories to the cloud. Then we started with understanding why we need to download media from the cloud from time to time. Followed by the different ways we can download photos/videos using different devices. We learned that we can only download one media file at a time when using a mobile device. But this is not true when we are using PCs or laptops for the same purpose. On our systems, we can download media in three ways – one media at a time, multiple media at once, and all the media in one go. We also went through the walkthroughs of each of the ways. 

Another thing that we learned was that it is currently not possible to download all our media at once using Google Photos. This is where we were introduced to Google Takeout, which is used to download not just Google Photos’ data but everything present in the Google Cloud. This is again, a powerful tool when considering backup options. With this, the article comes to its conclusion, and we hope it helps you in understanding the nitty-gritty of downloading your media from Google Photos!